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ARTIST STATEMENT: We can be prisoners of those who make up categories. They are usually never the "doers" but the parasites on the host - they have no guts! Making art takes guts. My intention is to shatter perceptions by making the best art possible; using whatever media is suggested by the idea.

Scrambling up conventions/conventional thinking with no limits, for there are no limits. Breaking down the barriers, sailing uncharted waters to make myself and others think/view differently. This process can be alarming, controversial, exhilaratingÉbut necessary to the process. By doing so, I hope to challenge the critic, spectator, and collector - forcing them to feel and see differently. Tearing down the walls, presenting new experiences.

Mary Bero's tightly constructed and highly stylized work is unique to her hand. They are tribal, urban, and indigenous. They have the look and feel of relics that were from a time past, but once viewed closely, one realizes that the are too surreal to be from any other time - but the present. Her work combines paper, thread, and cloth together and separately. They present worlds of calm and schizophrenia meshed together. Bero's work can be broken down by subject matter into three groups: portraits of faces resembling tribal mask, surreal landscapes, and works combining both. Her work is exhibited internationally and included in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and Textile Forum, Hannover Germany.